So much detail

One of the reasons that I prefer constructing dollshouses to actually furnishing them is that there is just so much detail required to give any semblance of realism.  You can spend a couple of hours creating one small thing to tuck into one corner of a scene where it gets almost lost even though it adds to the atmosphere.  Yet a couple of hours might be the only amount of time I get to dollshouse during a working week.

Doing a quilting shop is very detail intensive since your average quilt shop is packed chocka full with stuff.  But I am soldiering on.

I unearthed some 'cutting mats' that I had printed off a few years ago and glued to green card, when I was building the cutting station for the main shop.  This time I cut out the smaller mats to use on the workshop tables on the top floor. Now I need to work out how to simulate 1/12th scale rotary cutters to go with the mats.

My two hours this week was spent putting together a Phoenix Miniatures white metal kit DH51 antique sewing machine.  This is how it comes, and at first I didn't understand how to put it together (there are no instructions).  I did some googling and found it was a model of a Wilcox and Gibbs sewing machine, then found this fabulous website which had pictures of actual old machines to help me understand how to assemble and paint it.

So I glued it together with Zap-a-Gap but left the base separate.  I painted the machine with Games Workshop (GW) Chaos Black, GW Chain Mail, GW Scorched Brown and GW Burnished Gold.  The base is supposed to be wood, so I painted that with Scorched Brown, drybrushed with GW Snakebite Leather, and painted the feet with Burnished Gold. I finished them both with a gloss varnish but in retrospect I think it would have been better to do the wood in a satin varnish as it came out looking too shiny. The gold decoration was way too tiny for me to paint so I just 'scribbled' with the tip of a toothpick dipped in Burnished Gold to give an effect.  If you are wondering what I am holding, it's a wine cork topped with bluetack which my DH came up with as a handy way to hold small things you are trying to paint.  I think he saw the idea on someone else's website.

The machine was placed on top of one of the display cases in the knitting shop, as a cute accent.